Sorry for the OT, but was it ever confirmed what the shortblock from BMW consisted of? It was in the $3700 range, and one of the vendors was claiming it is in fact an entire block/crank/rods/pistons/all bearings, etc. If that is in fact true, it wouldn't be a whole lot more $$ to get a completely fresh engine (probably do a little head refurbishing too).

OP-Did you try to see what BMW wanted for all new parts, or did you know you were going to do the machining and everything anyways. I suppose if you get the machining done for free, it's not a big financial hit.

A short block can come in two variants - block on its own, or with bearings, rods, crank and pistons. The full works is a lot more than $3700 If I wanted a fresh short block with all internals from BMW Germany I would have had to part with something north of 7000 Euros (exact price is unconfirmed, as I wasn't interested in it anyway)

I was never going to stick with an OEM engine - I knew that upgraded internals were going to be needed for my car at some point, given the type of driving the car is subjected to. And there's something really nice about knowing that the engine in a car is quite bespoke and built to be a bit special

I have a creepy feeling the extra load upgraded turbos generate takes a major part in the abnormal engine wear. Any thoughts in this direction E92fan? Well, it will certainly handle a LOT more power now after the phenomenal rebuild.

I have a creepy feeling the extra load upgraded turbos generate takes a major part in the abnormal engine wear. Any thoughts in this direction E92fan? Well, it will certainly handle a LOT more power now after the phenomenal rebuild.

Now that many more have them only time will tell.

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I have a creepy feeling the extra load upgraded turbos generate takes a major part in the abnormal engine wear. Any thoughts in this direction E92fan? Well, it will certainly handle a LOT more power now after the phenomenal rebuild.

Like others have said, i think its more of what you are asking of the car. If you have all that power and run it hard all the time...yes mostly internals will suffer. But on the other hand, some guys dont run their cars hard at all, only when needed .

I'm a bit worried about upgraded turbos and stock piston to cylinder clearance. I'm convinced it is like E92fan states, that the piston skirts has scuffed against the cylinder walls. The reason this is the case in his engine but was not shown in e.g. Enrico's engine, is almost for sure E92fan has been running a lot with upgraded turbos in combination with hard driving on the Nurburgring during 8 minutes per lap. The pressure from upgraded turbos is much higher in average than for stock turbos. You just need to touch the pedal on low RPM's to get a lot of boost on upgraded units. This means the average power is a lot higher, which is the purpose for the upgrade, but i also means the piston temperature will be a lot higher. Power does not come for free, the higher the power level is, the higher the piston temperature will be.

The solution is not just to increase the capacity of the cooling system, this will in fact increase the risk for scuffing since the cylinder bore will enlarge less, it is to increase the skirt to cylinder clearance. This can be done also with stock pistons, it is just to hone the cylinder slightly and put in new rings. But since this includes a lot of work and money it is better to put in new pistons at the same time with a bit lower CR and hopefully also stronger than the stock items. The requirement for a correct piston to cylinder clearance for maximum load in the specific application is still there of course. Forged pistons are well known to expand a lot more than cast items. I guess BMW did not designe the N54 to withstand the abuse from upgraded turbos but instead designed it for as little piston and ring wear as possible and to get the engine reasonable quiet.

Really? I thought forged pistons were more thermodynamically stable? Virtually all boosted engines use them where even some very high performance NA engines use cast pistons.

Anyway, the posts are a thing of beauty.

This is correct, they are more stable to higher temps(max temps, so they dont deform, expand which cause excessive wear) and cast is a molded piece of metal. The stockers need a lower compression tho, IMO. I will be getting forged lowER compression pistons when its time for it.

Isnt EGTs monitoring a very good clue in how temps in the cylinders/pistons are increasing? I have put a EGT probe in my car will be interesting to monitor different boost levels and the effects on meth injection.

Isnt EGTs monitoring a very good clue in how temps in the cylinders/pistons are increasing? I have put a EGT probe in my car will be interesting to monitor different boost levels and the effects on meth injection.

+1, I will be getting one with my new hpf exhaust. I am going to compare its temps to the new rixster gauge egt's when it gets here. Rixster takes its info from the o2 sensors. Where do you get a reading from the probe? and was it hard to setup? When you run meth, IAT's and EGT's are lower, do you have the technical data tho...side-by-side comparo?

How in the whole world could we know the critical value for EGT vs. piston scuffing? It is also not a momentary figure that can be monitored in the exhaust system, it is the actual temperature of the piston skirt vs. available clearance that sets the limit.

How in the whole world could we know the critical value for EGT vs. piston scuffing? It is also not a momentary figure that can be monitored in the exhaust system, it is the actual temperature of the piston skirt vs. available clearance that sets the limit.

I wasnt speaking of scuffing the wall, I was talking about the heat of the internals and their structural integrity under high temps. Keeping them below a certain threshold( i have not tested this) will help engine life last longer. I cannot see a direct relationship between temps and wall scuffing tho.

+1, I will be getting one with my new hpf exhaust. I am going to compare its temps to the new rixster gauge egt's when it gets here. Rixster takes its info from the o2 sensors. Where do you get a reading from the probe? and was it hard to setup? When you run meth, IAT's and EGT's are lower, do you have the technical data tho...side-by-side comparo?

You're not going to get any useful info from mounting an EGT gauage in the HPF exhaust, or downpipes for that matter. If you want to get any valuable data, you'll have to mount it in the exhaust manifold pre-turbo.